Arab governors continued striking Sasanian-style drachms with added Arabic Kufic legends (bismillah). Abd al-Malik's reform (696/77 AH) introduced epigraphic-only Islamic coinage — the silver dirham and gold dinar.
Arab-Sasanian and early Islamic coins are the money of Iran between the Arab conquest of 651 CE and the high caliphal period: first Sasanian-looking silver drachms with Arabic marginal phrases, then, after the reform of Abd al-Malik in 696–697 CE, purely epigraphic dirhams and gold dinars with no images at all.
| Period | 651 CE – c. 1000 CE |
|---|---|
| Transitional coin | Arab-Sasanian drachm, ~4.0 g, Pahlavi + Arabic |
| Reformed coin | Epigraphic silver dirham, ~2.9 g |
| Gold | Dinar, ~4.25 g, struck sparingly in the east |
| Key mints | Basra, Kufa, Ray, Nishapur, Bukhara, Damascus |
| Dating | AH (Hijri) years, written out in Arabic words |
The Arab conquest did not change the money. Governors in Basra, Fars and Khurasan carried on striking Sasanian-type drachms — crowned bust, fire altar, Pahlavi legend — because that was what the population accepted. The only immediate change is a short Arabic phrase in the obverse margin, most often bismillah (in the name of God).
These Arab-Sasanian issues are the most legible record anywhere of a state changing hands without a monetary collapse. Names of the new Arab governors appear in Pahlavi script, dates run in the Yazdgerd era, and the whole design remains Zoroastrian in imagery while the authority behind it is Muslim.
In 696–697 CE (AH 77–78) the caliph Abd al-Malik replaced the whole system with a purely epigraphic coinage. The image of the ruler and the fire altar disappear; both faces carry Qur'anic text and the declaration of faith, arranged as a central legend inside a circular marginal legend.
The reformed silver dirham weighs about 2.9 g on a broad thin flan; the gold dinar sits near 4.25 g. The marginal legend gives the mint and the AH year written out in words — which makes the entire Islamic series precisely datable and mint-attributable, and is why it is one of the most systematically collected fields in world numismatics.
As caliphal control loosened, Iranian dynasties struck in their own names while formally acknowledging the caliph: the Tahirids at Nishapur and Ray, the Saffarids in Sistan, the Samanids at Samarkand, Bukhara and Nishapur, the Buyids in Fars and Iraq.
Samanid dirhams are the classic Silk Road coin — struck in enormous quantity and exported north, they are found in Viking hoards from Sweden to Ireland. A Samanid dirham of Nishapur in a Gotland hoard is the single clearest object lesson in early medieval trade reach.
Start with the marginal legend on the reverse: it reads "in the name of God, this dirham was struck at [mint] in the year [year written in words]". Learning ten mint names and the Arabic numerals-as-words covers most of the market.
Common Umayyad and Abbasid dirhams in fine condition are inexpensive. Value rises with scarce mints, first-year issues, complete unclipped flans and full legible margins. Gold dinars of any early caliph are expensive; Arab-Sasanian pieces naming rare governors are the specialist's target.
Arab-Sasanian drachms (651–700 CE) bear governors' names like Ziyad ibn Abi Sufyan and Ubayd Allah ibn Ziyad in Pahlavi, with bismillah in Arabic margin.
Reformed coinage under the Umayyads and Abbasids carried only Qur'anic inscriptions — no images — a rule observed for centuries.
Iranian Buyid, Samanid, Saffarid, Ghaznavid, Seljuq and Ilkhanid issues followed the dinar/dirham/fals system with regional variations.
Ubayd Allah ibn Ziyad
ObverseSasanian bust of Khosrow II type + Arabic bismillah in margin.
ReverseFire altar + Arabic governor's name.
Transitional issue — Sasanian iconography continued for 50 years after the conquest.
Abd al-Malik (post-reform)
ObverseShahada in centre; mint and date in margin.
ReverseQur'an 112 (al-Ikhlas).
First purely epigraphic Islamic coin — a revolution in monetary art.
Abd al-Malik I (Samanid)
ObverseShahada, ruler's name, caliph's name.
ReverseQur'anic verse, mint and date.
Samanid silver dirhams flooded Viking-age trade; vast hoards found from Russia to Sweden.
Mas'ud III (Ghaznavid)
ObverseShahada + sultan's titles.
ReverseCaliph's name in Kufic.
Ghaznavid Indian campaigns funded vast gold issues from Mahmud onward.
Malik-Shah I
ObverseShahada and sultan's titles.
ReverseAbbasid caliph al-Muqtadi.
Issued across a vast empire from Anatolia to Transoxiana.
Citing Ghazan Khan as overlord
ObverseShahada in square frame (post-conversion to Islam).
ReverseGhazan's titles in Arabic.
Reformed coinage after Ghazan's conversion; bilingual issues.
Tahir ibn Husayn
ObverseShahada with caliph al-Ma'mun named.
ReverseTahirid governor's name and mint.
Tahir founded the first quasi-independent Iranian Islamic dynasty in Khorasan (821–873), nominally loyal to the Abbasid caliph.
Ya'qub ibn al-Layth al-Saffar
ObverseShahada in Kufic.
ReverseCaliph's name with Ya'qub's titles in margin.
The 'Coppersmith' rose from a militia leader in Sistan to ruling Iran from Fars to Khorasan — founder of the Saffarid dynasty and a hero of Iranian self-rule against the Abbasids.
'Adud al-Dawla (Buyid)
ObverseShahada with Abbasid caliph al-Ta'i named.
Reverse'Adud al-Dawla's titles, including 'Shahanshah' — a revival of the pre-Islamic Persian title.
The Buyids (934–1062) controlled the caliph in Baghdad while openly using Persian royal titulature on their coinage — a deliberate Iranian revival.
Arghun Khan (Ilkhanid)
ObverseArabic legend with Mongol tamgha.
ReverseUighur-script titles of the Great Khan.
Bilingual Arabic-Uighur issue from the Mongol Ilkhanate of Iran, before Ghazan's conversion to Islam.
Caliph Harun al-Rashid
ObverseShahada in three lines; marginal legend with Qur'an 9:33 and AH date.
ReverseContinuation of Qur'anic legend, with caliph's name and title.
Struck at the height of the Abbasid Caliphate's prestige under the patron of the 'Thousand and One Nights' court. Abbasid gold dinars circulated as the dominant trade coin from al-Andalus to Sogdia, and the standard was rigorously maintained for over two centuries.
Issued under Caliph al-Mahdi
ObverseStylised Sasanian-style bust derived from Khosrow II; Pahlavi legend.
ReverseFire altar with attendants; Arabic governor's name in margin; Tabari (post-Yazdgerd) era date.
Long after the Arab conquest the Caspian province of Tabaristan retained semi-autonomous local dynasties (Dabuyids, then Abbasid governors) who continued striking Sasanian-style half-drachms with Pahlavi script — among the latest survivals of pre-Islamic Iranian coinage, well into the late 8th century.
Mu'izz al-Din Muhammad of Ghor
ObverseShahada with Caliph al-Nasir named; sultan's titles in marginal legend.
ReverseRuler's full titulature in Arabic.
Mu'izz al-Din (also Muhammad of Ghor) extended Ghurid rule from Afghanistan into northern India, founding the Delhi Sultanate's precursor state. His coinage circulated from Herat to the Gangetic plain.
'Ala' al-Din Muhammad II
ObverseShahada with Khwarazmshah titles.
ReverseCaliph's name in Arabic; mint and date.
Muhammad II ruled one of the largest empires of the Islamic Middle Ages — from the Caspian to the Indus — but his execution of Mongol envoys provoked Genghis Khan's catastrophic invasion of 1219–1221, ending the Khwarazmian state and beginning the Mongol era in Iran.
Qadir Khan Yusuf
ObverseShahada with Qarakhanid Turko-Islamic titles.
ReverseRuler's tamgha (tribal sigil) alongside Caliph al-Qa'im's name.
First major Turkic Islamic dynasty east of the Oxus. Their billon dirhams reflect the chronic silver shortage ('silver famine') that plagued the eastern Islamic world from the late 10th century. Image: related Ghaznavid gold dinar.
Möngke Khan (in name of Great Khan)
ObverseMongol tamgha with 'al-Khaqan al-A'zam Mangu Qa'an' in Arabic.
ReverseShahada in central panel — pragmatic compromise with the Muslim population.
Pre-Ilkhanate Mongol coinage of Iran and Transoxiana, struck before Hulagu's conversion of his line to a Persian-style sultanate. Image: related Ilkhanid dirham.